Obsolete curriculum?

Way off topic here, but I was thinking of how to seal the edges of a Nomex parachute, and it occurred to me that sewing classes are no longer taught in the public schools. Got me thinking (dangerous in my case) of what other classes are no longer commonplace in the school curriculum. Came up with these:
1. Penmanship: Spent hours in elementary school learning this, but it's no longer mandatory in my state. Does anybody use cursive script anymore?
2. Home economics (for girls): Sewing and cooking classes. A sewing machine used to be commonplace in the American household. How many young ladies own one now? And where do they learn the fine points of cooking, other than from their mom?
3. Math: Long division and multiplication tables. I know kids are no longer being taught this, but what happens when the batteries in their electronic devices dies, or all they have is a paper and pencil? Getting the correct answer from a machine is fine, but it worries me if they don't understand the process.
4. Typing and 10 key: Using a QWERTY keyboard and 10 key machine proficiently took me hours of drills to develop the mind/muscle connection. Is the physical part of this still being taught, or do computer classes now concentrate on running the apps?

Guess I'm showing my age, but are there any others you can think of?

Typing, home ec, and shop were always optional when I was in school. I took wood shop and metal shop because they were fun, but I didn't have to. I took typing, but still can't type worth a crap.

Where are you getting your info about multiplication and division? My kids are homeschooled, so I have no idea what's passing for education in the public schools these days.

I took typing, as I saw the need: higher education and these newly fangled "compewters" require "typing"; mashing out text on a keyboard. I took shop / industrial arts as I was a boy, girls took home ec (economics) although I knew 2 girls that took shop and one boy who took home ec. Both courses disappeared very shortly after I graduated ('85). Latin was discontinued when I started high school, and 'book keeping was also discontinued when I started.

Drafting seems to be phasing out of engineering school, as well as some CAD courses.. (How many young engineers I've seen & corrected their works because they can't draft. Knowing how to use AutoCAD does not make you a drafter, nor know how to draft up your idea!!)

Surprised about the 'no longer need certain math skills because I have a calculator' scenario. You should know what the answer is gonna be, ball park, before you mash numbers into it..

Bring back 'BASIC' as a programming course. We learned how to 'code' on the old Apple IIe machines, how to write code, think logically, progress thru a series of steps.. and trouble shoot the program.

Bat-mite said:

Typing, home ec, and shop were always optional when I was in school. I took wood shop and metal shop because they were fun, but I didn't have to. I took typing, but still can't type worth a crap.

Where are you getting your info about multiplication and division? My kids are homeschooled, so I have no idea what's passing for education in the public schools these days.

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This from Wikipedia:

Place in education[edit]
Inexpensive calculators and computers have become the most common way to solve division problems, eliminating a traditional mathematical exercise, and decreasing the educational opportunity to show how to do so by paper and pencil techniques. (Internally, those devices use one of a variety of division algorithms). In the United States, long division has been especially targeted for de-emphasis, or even elimination from the school curriculum, by reform mathematics, though traditionally introduced in the 4th or 5th grades.

I seem to remember reading that public school kids would be issued calculators a long while back in my state. Meaning long division would no longer be taught, and multiplication tables would not have to be memorized. But my foggy memory might be mistaken.

I took both home ec and shop in middle school. Home ec is why I can make my own parachutes, on my mom's 1960's era Kenmore (love that machine until I have to lift it). Home ec still exists, now named Family and Consumer Science in Seattle. Shop classes are getting further between though.

My older kid had auto shop in high school and a Rhino drafting class in middle school. My younger kid went to a different middle school and didn't have that option, though an intro to engineering class introduced the younger to Autodesk Inventor. I'm not so worried about typing. My kids spend a lot of time typing.

There's a lot of disagreement about how to teach math effectively. On one side, you have people who say that you have to make math interesting to get kids to learn it, and on the other side that they have to have the fundamentals (eg times tables) drilled into their heads or the future stuff is a lot harder. I don't really know what the answer is, but it's a messy discussion.

For shop classes especially, and to some extent home ec, there are two problems with keeping the classes going. First, the classes are expensive because they take a fair amount of specialized equipment, and there is somewhat more liability to teaching them. It's like why engineering students are more expensive to teach at the college level than business/law types. Second, there's less space for electives in many students' schedules as they fill up with academic classes in the college admissions arms race. If the classes aren't full of kids, they'll get dropped. Most state tests that determine whether a school is "failing" only cover English, math, and sometimes science. Anything that isn't on that list gets shorter shrift. I do think that these classes are important, just highlighting why they are disappearing from schools.

dr wogz said:

I took typing, as I saw the need: higher education and these newly fangled "compewters" require "typing"; mashing out text on a keyboard. I took shop / industrial arts as I was a boy, girls took home ec (economics) although I knew 2 girls that took shop and one boy who took home ec. Both courses disappeared very shortly after I graduated ('85). Latin was discontinued when I started high school, and 'book keeping was also discontinued when I started.

Drafting seems to be phasing out of engineering school, as well as some CAD courses.. (How many young engineers I've seen & corrected their works because they can't draft. Knowing how to use AutoCAD does not make you a drafter, nor know how to draft up your idea!!)

Surprised about the 'no longer need certain math skills because I have a calculator' scenario. You should know what the answer is gonna be, ball park, before you mash numbers into it..

Bring back 'BASIC' as a programming course. We learned how to 'code' on the old Apple IIe machines, how to write code, think logically, progress thru a series of steps.. and trouble shoot the program.

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Drafting 101 was a requirement for first year engineering students at my university in '72. Compasses, T-squares, art gum erasers, and slide rules. Brings back memories. I remember after one class our professor was talking about a new device which cost about $200 at the time, called a digital calculator. I think Hewlitt Packard was the only name manufacturer. He said it would be a game changer.

Wow, so my kids, 9 and 7, who can do long division and know their times tables are going to be unique amongst their peers? Cool. They can do fractions, too.

Yeah, like they say, you get what you pay for. Although I graduated from the public school system, I did take a couple of summer courses at the top private high school in the state. BIG difference. Pristine facilities, motivated teachers. The classes were actually enjoyable.
Took a swing by my old alma mater recently. The high school is no longer fielding a swim team because the pool is in disrepair. So sad.

Despite what I said above, I think that my kids got/are getting as good or better education in a public high school than I did in a private one. A lot depends on the local district and especially the principal.

kuririn said:

Yeah, like they say, you get what you pay for. Although I graduated from the public school system, I did take a couple of summer courses at the top private high school in the state. BIG difference. Pristine facilities, motivated teachers. The classes were actually enjoyable.
Took a swing by my old alma mater recently. The high school is no longer fielding a swim team because the pool is in disrepair. So sad.

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That is sad. My old high school is also really run down. When I started there in 1981, the school had just entered into the decline of the theater department. At one time, the school was famous for its musicals. People would come from all over the area to see the plays there.

By the time I got there and enrolled in my first play, they were down to doing only straight plays, no music. No coordination of the theater with the orchestra. Dance classes were gone. I did eleven high school plays, but they were only attended by parents and grandparents of the cast, and the occasional teacher/administrator.

Now the theater building is only used for assemblies.

My elementary schoolers still have to memorize their multiplication facts up to 15 x 15, and know how to solve higher by hand. They have to be able to do long division by hand with both fractional remainders and decimal also. There is a much greater emphasis on quick math through proper use of estimating mainly as a way to smell test your answers, or deal with very large numbers without a calculator (one of the most useful practical skills you can have I think). They do a lot more word problems that make you build your expression than I did at their age too. All in all, I think their math education is well ahead of my elementary school experience, both in traditional ways of doing it and in the use of electronics.

They also still have to learn cursive (which I think is a GIGANTIC waste of time)...my wife vehemently disagrees with me.

Typing is one of those things they are just picking up by necessity as some of their work has to be handed in electronically, but other than some typing directed games during computer time they didn't formally study it.

The only thing that has really faded compared to my education 30 years prior is home-ec and shop. My wife and I take up that teaching though, and I prefer it that way. We also believe that boy or girl you need to be able to fully take care of yourself, so our boys learn homemaking type activities and "shop" type activities both...cooking, cleaning, yard work, home maintenance, personal finance, etc. I don't want the school reinforcing "women's work" / "men's work" thinking either explicitly or implicitly. I think you should be able to take care of yourself entirely regardless of gender, that should be the goal.

As with anything YMMV. My kids go to a pretty good public school, and I realize schools differ widely, but a lot of the basic stuff hasn't gone away. Some of it, rightfully in some cases, has.

kuririn said:

Drafting 101 was a requirement for first year engineering students at my university in '72. Compasses, T-squares, art gum erasers, and slide rules. Brings back memories. I remember after one class our professor was talking about a new device which cost about $200 at the time, called a digital calculator. I think Hewlitt Packard was the only name manufacturer. He said it would be a game changer.

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My dad still has his. Hewlett-Packard 35 with "reverse Polish notation". and the little red 'neon' digits...

were I to judge from various news outlets...I would say that vocabulary and the ability to proofread are rapidly disappearing skills.
Rex

dr wogz said:

My dad still has his. Hewlett-Packard 35 with "reverse Polish notation". and the little red 'neon' digits...

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HP sells the 35-s which is a re-release and update of the original from 1972. I bought the HP35 in the 2nd quarter Freshman year of engineering school in the Spring of 72. I never regretted that purchase.

If you want a great calculator app for your phone checkout PCalc, which can be set to reverse Polish notation which is how I keep it set [emoji3]

Kuririn, No, your not showing your age. If we ever loose the electrical grid, cell towers and the internet the younger generations will find it hard to function. Could they build a fire? Could they sewing on a button? Can they do math on paper with a pencil? Could they build themselves a shelter? Could they find their way to different points with out using GPS? And oh, yes, could they write a letter or keep a journal?...Basic skills lost because we have become lazy, or, rely too much on the Smartphones???

Many of the skills that I was brought up on in the 50's and 60's were considered the norm. You were taught these skills so you could go out into society and survive and function as a self-supporting citizen.

I remember asking my fellow engineers how to use a slide rule. I had picked one up at a garage sale back in the late 90's. While they were all keen to see it & play with it, none had foggiest idea how to use it. Well, I believe one did get it to do a log function after about 10 minutes of studying & playing with it..

tightwad said:

Kuririn, No, your not showing your age. If we ever loose the electrical grid, cell towers and the internet the younger generations will find it hard to function. Could they build a fire? Could they sewing on a button? Can they do math on paper with a pencil? Could they build themselves a shelter? Could they find their way to different points with out using GPS? And oh, yes, could they write a letter or keep a journal?...Basic skills lost because we have become lazy, or, rely too much on the Smartphones???

Many of the skills that I was brought up on in the 50's and 60's were considered the norm. You were taught these skills so you could go out into society and survive and function as a self-supporting citizen.

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Well, let's put it this way: the ones who can do those things will be the ones who survive.

kuririn said:

[...]Got me thinking (dangerous in my case) of what other classes are no longer commonplace in the school curriculum. Came up with these:
1. Penmanship: Spent hours in elementary school learning this, but it's no longer mandatory in my state. Does anybody use cursive script anymore?
2. Home economics (for girls): Sewing and cooking classes. A sewing machine used to be commonplace in the American household. How many young ladies own one now? And where do they learn the fine points of cooking, other than from their mom?
3. Math: Long division and multiplication tables. I know kids are no longer being taught this, but what happens when the batteries in their electronic devices dies, or all they have is a paper and pencil? Getting the correct answer from a machine is fine, but it worries me if they don't understand the process.
4. Typing and 10 key: Using a QWERTY keyboard and 10 key machine proficiently took me hours of drills to develop the mind/muscle connection. Is the physical part of this still being taught, or do computer classes now concentrate on running the apps?

Guess I'm showing my age, but are there any others you can think of?

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I think you are off the mark on some of the above.
My kids (8 & 10) had already BOTH learned #3 (no calculators in the classroom) and #4 a while back, and now submit their written assignments/essays/homework by email, straight to the teacher. iPads at home, and in the classroom.

w.r.t #1, writing cursive is faster (and looks more professional than letter-blocks), but since most written forms of communication are handled by means of #4 these days, is kinda superfluous.

#2 is silly, and blatantly sexist. I'm happy my daughter is not exposed to #2.

boatgeek said:

Despite what I said above, I think that my kids got/are getting as good or better education in a public high school than I did in a private one. A lot depends on the local district and especially the principal.

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VERY true.
The education standards and resources are very much driven by the ambition, competency, and funding of the local school districts. Those tend to vary 2x-10x from town to town.

My property taxes went up this year again, and are now north of $2xK/year. But the school district is nationally ranked.
Taxes bite, as do the bills for after school activities, but you get what you pay for.
Still cheaper, and better, than most researched private school alternatives.

Bat-mite said:

[...]My kids are homeschooled, so I have no idea what's passing for education in the public schools these days.
[...]Wow, so my kids, 9 and 7, who can do long division and know their times tables are going to be unique amongst their peers? Cool. They can do fractions, too.

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Not likely, not for the top 25% of the school districts (except for the states on the bottom of the list below).
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/education

I looked at home schooling, briefly, but could never solve for the lack of social / emotional maturity.
Kids need a place to get frustrated with, and overcome social interaction challenges. And that requires a group setting, preferably of like-minded, intellectually curious peers.

YMMV,
a

I do believe there is a place for Home ec, (and not just for 'girls') I also strongly believe in shop class. Both of these offer a few skills many seem to expect to be learned at home.. You may not need to know how to operate a sewing machine, but how to proper cook something, and know what salmonella is, and how to avoid it. They may not need to know how to fix a 4-cyle engine, but knowing eh parts helps when their car does need to be taken to the shop (and so they don't get burned when the mechanic tells them their filbert flange isn't meshing with their Johnson gear properly. Or how to proper nail / screw something together. Both of these courses gives them some "hands on' projects to show a bit of creativity, get dirty, and produce something other than a paper..

learning how to balance a budget, pay bills, understand that a 30% loan is ridiculous should also be taught.

We teach kids sex ed in schools, how to play basketball, etc.. yet some of the "basics in life", to manage a home, seem to get passed by..

afadeev said:

I think you are off the mark on some of the above.
I looked at home schooling, briefly, but could never solve for the lack of social / emotional maturity.
Kids need a place to get frustrated with, and overcome social interaction challenges. And that requires a group setting, preferably of like-minded, intellectually curious peers.

YMMV,
a

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Nah, we keep them in a closet and don't believe in interaction with other children.

Well, actually, they have Sunday school, two homeschool co-ops, neighborhood friends, rec and parks sports, birthday parties, etc. I guess MMDV (my miles do vary).

Whoops, looks like there's been some misunderstanding here. Allow me to clarify:

Never stated that long division and multiplication tables were phased out nationwide. But they are in some school districts, including mine.

Never stated or implied that sewing and cooking were only for girls. What I listed was a course curriculum being offered in my school during the 60's that was gender specific. Parents would consult a psychiatrist if their son played with dolls. Of course now that we are more enlightened, we know better. Times have changed, but this was the culture of the 50's and 60's. View it in that context.

Learning life skills are necessary for our children no matter what their gender. Look at me, I need to serge the edges of my parachute, and I have access to my mom's old sewing machine, but don't know the first thing about using it.

As for cursive handwriting, I still think it's a vital skill, and nobody's going to change my mind. So there.

I re-read what I wrote, and I see how it could be read as I was accusing you of gender-typing work...sorry about that. This is (one of) the issues with the interwebs...can't type context, at least I can't. My irritation was directed at what I saw in my schooling, and am glad is not in my children's.

As for cursive, we will have to agree to disagree...also difficult for the interwebs.

No offense taken, actually I was responding to afadeev's post. Agree with what you are saying, especially since it comes from an educator's perspective.

to toss another monkey in the pit:

Are schools / teachers becoming babysitters? are parents pushing / expecting schools to teach / show them the ways of growing up?! (Are parents skirting their parental duties and expecting teachers to do it for them?!)

My three kids go to a small-ish private school that adopted a new math curriculum a couple years ago. Less emphasis on "math facts" and more emphasis on different ways to solve problems. The only good thing about the curriculum was that it encouraged parental involvement--because without my intervention, my kids would have never learned math!

I was thinking about this. And thinking about all the skills I've acquired in my life. Some were (more-or-less) by necessity; for education, for a job, or similar circumstances. Others were just for fun - I learned how to sail ten years before I learned how to drive a car. A few skills were...the best way I can put it is that they were a pathway to somewhere else I wanted to be. One example of this was drafting. I took Vo-Tech drafting my Junior year in High School. I saw it as necessary to be able to communicate certain types of my ideas to others. Welding, same thing. I had designs and ideas that needed to come out of my head (the first things I welded were sculptures).

Today a lot of these same skills aren't taught because we have such a wide range of technological conveniences. No one needs a slide rule because they have a calculator. No one learns calligraphy because they have a printer and a computer with a word processor with every font ever designed. Cooking is taking a frozen dinner out of the freezer and sticking it in the microwave.

If there was one skill I would demand my kid learn, and learn to do well, it's read. Not on a computer, not on a tablet or phone, or with any electronic device.
Words
Printed
On
Paper.

...stopping before I go off on a rant

kuririn said:

No offense taken, actually I was responding to afadeev's post. Agree with what you are saying, especially since it comes from an educator's perspective.

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Just to be clear - my comments were in no way a knock on home-schooling folks (hi Bat-mite), nor a wholesale endorsement of the current public education system. It certainly has plenty of room for improvement.
I thought I had responded to the 4 observations made, 2 of which were inconsistent with the elementary school experience my kids are going through.

I have a LOT of misgivings about the present state of education, public and private. Mostly based on the educators' unwillingness to adjust their curriculum to customers (kids) varying interests and levels of creativity. It all starts with failure to see their audience as paying customers first and foremost (indirectly) vs. mostly unruly spoiled brats (which they also are).

On the balance, top-25% school districts are doing as good, or better, job of preparing kids for college today, then when I was growing up.
Not perfect, and certainly not as well as I would prefer they did. But, the gap is for the parent to fill, as appropriate.
If the parents are unwilling or unable to prioritize additional time, money, and effort into their kids education and character development, it's hardly schools' or society's fault.

kuririn said:

Never stated that long division and multiplication tables were phased out nationwide. But they are in some school districts, including mine.

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Good to know - I had no idea.
In what part of the country are you (TRF no longer shows posters' geography)?

kuririn said:

Never stated or implied that sewing and cooking were only for girls. What I listed was a course curriculum being offered in my school during the 60's that was gender specific. Parents would consult a psychiatrist if their son played with dolls. Of course now that we are more enlightened, we know better.

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I agree that there is less gender stereotyping today than when we were growing up, but a bunch of it got replaced with cynicism and legal CYA-ness.

Your comment about dolls makes it sound like you regret devolution of gender boundaries?
Or am I misreading your sentiment?

Were sewing and cooking classes really offered for, and catered to, boys when you were growing up?

kuririn said:

Learning life skills are necessary for our children no matter what their gender.

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Agreed.

But I do think there is one huge difference in K-12 education today vs. a generation ago: these days, the entire focus is on learning the skills required to excel in college / grad-school.
A generation or two ago, kids were expected to hit the workforce right post HS graduation. Thus the focus on developing skills appropriate for a given target outcome.

I'm not saying it's good or bad.
Just stating how it is.

a

In the end it really depends on the individual school within the school district. The type of education your kids receive can vary widely. My granddaughter was not taught multiplication tables - instead the school system used 'Common Core' curriculum. Parents were told not to teach their kids multiplication tables as this would mess them up in class. Then we moved to another state - went from a high ranking education state to a lower ranking state. Now in her higher math classes she has problems, because she doesn't know her multiplication tables. My grandson who is 6 years behind her, is now being taught multiplication tables. In the end, the local school system is ranked high, even though the state overall is not. I am glad we moved.

Second, it is not just in public school that the issue of being able to do skills manually has been impacted. I retired out of emergency services/health care. We have providers today who cannot complete a patient care report on paper - they were never taught. We have providers who cannot manually setup an IV drip rate as they were only taught how to use the IV pumps. We have dispatchers who do not know the area serviced by their department, what ambulance and fire companies are due to certain areas, etc. because the computer does it all. They simply read off the screen. When the power goes out, they are lost, and patient care suffers. There is now a push across the country to go back and teach these providers how to do paper reports, calculate drip rates manually, and learn response areas and companies.

Lastly, shop classes went away as there was a nationwide push to have all high schools focus solely on getting kids admitted to college (This was just starting when I graduated in 78). Very much like we have recently seen a push for STEM courses to be given priority funding in schools. The result is that today we have a shortage of skilled laborers - plumbers, carpenters, electricians, etc. If you watch "This Old House" on any weekend they usually have a segment on how they are now trying to get kids interested in the trades. For a number of kids, this is really the route they should be going down. Good pay, good benefits, and no huge student debt.

dr wogz said:

I remember asking my fellow engineers how to use a slide rule. I had picked one up at a garage sale back in the late 90's. While they were all keen to see it & play with it, none had foggiest idea how to use it. Well, I believe one did get it to do a log function after about 10 minutes of studying & playing with it..

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Slide rules are all about logarithms!!! That, and keeping track of decimal places. I learned how to use one in about grade 6, circa 1973 (Dad had one).

Somebody mentioned typing earlier. I did a class in that and it was great. I was the only guy . That same semester I also redid the year 12 maths that I failed, earning a distinction that time around. Didn't have to, but wanted to do it. Off to uni the year after that for engineering.

I think the secret to a good education is breadth of knowledge. Need the basics of each. The problem these days is that there is so much stuff taking time away from the useful academic topics.